In 2009, Jesse Dimmick entered the home of Jared and Lindsay Rowley and held them at knifepoint for a couple of hours. The three watched the movie Patch Adams and had snacks. When Dimmick fell asleep, the couple escaped and police, who had been in pursuit of Dimmick over a murder and a car theft, arrested him. Dimmick was shot during the arrest.

Various lawsuits followed. Dimmick sued the city of Topeka over the shooting, and (possibly because of the prospect that he might get money from that suit) the Rowleys sued Dimmick last September for trespass, intrusion and negligent infliction of emotional distress. That seems to have given Dimmick the idea to sue the Rowleys, and he brought a counterclaim against them for breach of contract.

You see, Dimmick alleges that, after breaking into the Rowleys' home with a knife and gun, they all then sat down and hashed out a deal under which they would hide him from police (the police who were right outside) for an unspecified amount of money. "Later," he complained, "the Rowleys reneged on said oral contract, resulting in my being shot in the back by authorities." Ergo, breach of contract.

An attorney for the Rowleys says, of course, that any contract with Dimmick is not valid. Link -via Boing Boing

It's interesting that the victims sued the perp. In most countries that just couldn't happen while criminal action was pending. That is almost as ridiculous as the fact that the perp is suing the victims.

It is starting to become apparent that most of the time these burglars are satisfied with a hot meal. Another burglary story today tells of a man who broke into the owner's meat freezer and fired up his BBQ to make some ribs. And I know of at least one other story in which the home-owner spoke to the burglar, determined his situation and offered to assist him financially as well as feeding him. In the end the "burglar" went home with a full belly and some hope for his future and the home-owner remained safe and probably felt good about helping the "burglar" out too.

"As far as accuracy goes, every story on Lowering the Bar (this is still part of the disclaimer, just a new paragraph of it) has at least one source that I consider to be reputable. WARNING: I consider Wikipedia to be “reputable,” depending on the circumstances. What this means, really, is that I don’t make stories up – everything here is at least based on a true story."

Also, there's a link in the article to the original source from the Topeka Capital-Journal.